Livin' the Dream in Lima

A few weeks ago, I went to turn on my laptop, like I do every night, and nothing happened. It 'tried' to boot up for almost an hour. Uh oh. [Insert minor freak-out.] My Business Man attempted a few things via Apple support but we had no luck. I decided to take it to the only computer shop in the Bean Town that works on Macs... and waited a few days for them to call me back. I finally got a call back, and was told the computer hard drive was completely crashed. Womp womp. All   my recipes, GONE! My business plan, GONE! All my pictures,  GONE!  All my math teaching documents,   GONE! (Though I wasn't too upset about that...) Yes, I am the brilliant person that has been using the same laptop for 4 years without backing anything up at all. So, I did what any person would do. Decided the people here in Lima must not know what they're talking about, so I took it to the Apple store in Columbus. Of course they told me the same thing. (At least I coerced a friend to ...

So this has been quite the depressing winter. Cold, snow, extreme cold, more snow, thoughts of "Will the temps ever get back above freezing??!" I'm beginning to think the mountain of snow at the end of our driveway will soon be taller than our house. (It's sitting about 8-9 feet right now.) When it's this cold, all I want to do is sit on the couch, wrapped in a blanket, and watch movies. And eat. Haha. I thought I'd share some new-to-us foods that we've been enjoying lately. Yes... a majority all of them might be junk food... but luckily I've been able to keep up the running to an extent so there hasn't been too  much damage. Lol. BBQ Chicken Nachos . I made these one night for dinner when we didn't really have anything else to eat. And I will make them again! They were fabulous. I just sauteed some chicken breast chunks in a bit of olive oil, then simmered them with BBQ sauce. (A thinner sauce works best.) Then spread tortilla chips out ...

So, I've got a pretty sweet gig. Working for myself, I get to set my hours... and I only have a couple days a week that are really jam-packed. (Unless it's close to a holiday, then it's pretty much 'work every moment I am awake'.) The weekly schedule is usually something like this: Monday - grocery store, bank, clean house/kitchen, test new recipes, chill out a little Tuesday - bake in preparation for cupcake counter on Wed Wednesday  - Sam's Club, finish up baking/prep work from Tues, sell cupcakes at counter from 3-6pm Thursday  - prepwork for weekend, grocery store (again), work on business plan/emails/marketing/etc Friday  - BAKE BAKE BAKE! This is my busiest baking day of the week. Saturday  - sell cupcakes at counter from 11am-3pm Sunday  - rest, hang out with my Business Man Everyday  - fill orders for pick-up at our house (pretty much a daily thing), update Facebook page, plan ahead for future holidays/specials So Mondays are a pre...

I haven't talked running much on the blog lately... heck I haven't talked much on the blog lately at all. The last big running thing I did was the Columbus Marathon back in October. I've taken the last several months very easy running-wise. Running what I want, when I want. If I don't feel like it, I don't worry about it. I've still been in the 30+ miles a week range, which might seem like a lot. (But back in the spring when I was training for Boston, I was putting in 55-60. So it's really been cut in half.) It's really kind of funny - I am way less  busy now than I was last spring. (When I was teaching + baking 80+ hours a week.) I had no problem getting motivated to run back then. I was up before 5:30am everyday of the week! Now that I'm working a much more normal amount (probably 35-45 hours, depending on the week), it's so much harder to get the runs in! I don't know if I've just come to appreciate sleep, or if it's being on...

After a busy, busy holiday season, I've decided I'd like to try to get back into blogging a little more regularly. I really miss having a place to write out my thoughts, musings, and whatever's on my mind. I also really enjoy being able to look back on different times of my life... and crazy shenanigans that have occurred. So, first post back - just a glimpse at the last month or so. 2013 was a great year, and we have so much to be thankful for. At the beginning of December, Sara's Sweets took part in the Downtown Lima Holiday Fest. We offered cupcake decorating for kids, and it was a huge success! About 250 kids came through, wowza. It was a crazy day, but lots of fun. The holiday season was NUTS (in a good way!) for Sara's Sweets. I baked closed to 5000 cupcakes in the month of December alone. It doesn't seem like that  many, but when I remember that I do all my baking out of my home kitchen with my one oven, it seems like a ton. Before ...

Also known as my first marathon where I DID NOT WALK! Woo hoo! (That was my one & only goal going into this race.) Biggest medal ever. I signed up for the race just 6 weeks before, so I didn't have much time to put in a lot of quality training. I decided to take a laid-back approach to this marathon and remember why I love running - because it's fun.  My Business Man and I headed down to Columbus Saturday afternoon, and strangely I was not nervous at all. We hit up the expo for some goodies. (Thank you, King's Hawaiian, for the 7 free product coupons!) Love that the tech shirts are long-sleeved this year... seems like I always need more cold weather running gear than hot weather running gear. Somehow we scored an awesome deal on a hotel room  corner suite. I swear, it was bigger than our first apartment. Bedroom, complete with lounge chair and hot tub. Bathroom with a double shower (with 3 shower heads on each side!) And then a full living room with a pull-...

I saw this idea for a blog post on another site, and thought I'd have some fun with it. Two foods I cannot get enough of: Peanut butter & pumpkin butter on a toasted cinnamon raisin bagel. It's the perfect fall lunch. Can I also mention that I love the fact that I get to eat lunch at home and actually toast my bagel? And not cram bathroom + lunch prep + eating + chill time all into a 26 minute lunch period? Mellowcreme pumpkins. Enough said about that. Two people I got to see this weekend: I drove over to the other side of IL to attend my BFF Talen's bridal shower. It was a lot of fun. This was the only pic I snapped of the day. Doesn't she make a gorgeous bride? Haha. I got to meet my mom for breakfast at Cracker Barrel on my way back Monday morning. Nothing like catching up over coffee & bacon. So good to see her.  Two new clothing purchases: I got my first maxi skirt. There was a deal on Pickyourplum.org and I ordered one for jus...